I'm a storyteller but I'm the worst kind

My muse has escaped me.

It struck me today- midday- because today was Talk About Poetry Finding You day, and there was Neruda with his infinitesimal pinpricks and Giovanni with her no-limits poetic explosion, and there I was: empty-minded.

I wrote because I told myself I had to, because I am trying to be more disciplined with my writing, and mostly because I always promise my poetry class that I will write every time they write. It's a fancy trick, that class. Last fall, I couldn't stop writing. Stanzas were thundering off the margins of my notebook. Theme, purpose, creativity itself deserted me: often, I was more a student than a teacher. I sat in the thick of creation.

But now. Muse? Whipped right out of me. I don't know when/how/why she left me. Maybe she's hiding. Maybe I've accidentally smothered her. Maybe I'm not suppose to know.

(Honestly: I think my muse collapsed into my Obscure Object, which undoubtedly caused some creative complications, and I'm not exactly willing to speak further on that at this moment.)

But a word (or many) about writing + me. I don't know when it began; it has simply always been there. It started full-force circa the age of 12 with highly improbably-set "novels" that I never finished. Then entered the journals, all but one of which are still hiding out in my closet, that captured an unbelievable amount of daily- though never mundane- details. [I forget the simplest things, but my memory is tightly wound and I never forget the things I want to remember.] Somewhere in the last two years of high school, I discovered blogging. My first blog (still alive, at times completely embarrassing, but ultimately totally entertaining- maybe just for me) carries on the tradition of the paper journals: detail after detail after detail. Some coding exists in place of real names, and I confess that I can't decipher all of it. When LiveJournal became "all the rage," I got one. Then a second. Then a third. Over the last eight years, I've opened at least 6 LiveJournals; today just three remain; one is infrequently updated.

Something happened in my transition from blogging to LJ-ing. I lost a part of my writer's voice in the shuffle. It took a couple of years for me to realize this, but I never did anything about it until two summers ago. I then returned to my original blog and brought a modified voice to it: that of someone who had learned the fine art of ambiguity.

But again, something was off. I needed that sensationalized clean slate, so I started fresh with a new blogspot (hello, clean slate). After a significant transfer of posts, the writing started to come back to me. The ambiguity hit a new all-time high, and the coding began again. I took this blog underground last winter or spring, but have since gone "live" once more. I'm still not sure how I feel about that, but I was tired of being undercover. I was tired of letting loose only to pull everything back in.

You can trace all of this ambiguity and vagueness to my Obscure Object- which, admittedly, has taken on a few different forms over the last 10 years. But this is another story for another (blog)post.

Maybe I don't need my Obscure Object-corrupted muse. I generally don't believe that I have one, and truthfully, I'm currently using it as an excuse for my lack of word-flow. Or maybe this is just a concrete representation of how much has changed in my life from this point one, two, even three years ago ----> to how my life exists today. Maybe I need to make more mix cds because I tell the best stories with other people's music and words. Maybe none of this makes sense.

Years ago, at what I now realize was an incredibly important and life-shaping proverbial fork-in-the-road, I wrote this: "...because everything here has been so 'almost.'"

It's true: almost.

this will go unsent.

I won't burden you with specifics, but here's the truth: I'm fucking crazy about you.

I'm not going to belabor my point with citing how long I've felt this way (longer than I'd like to admit) or how it came to be (slow, then with the speed of an undammed waterfall) or what I'd like you to say in response (ok, alright, me too, or not but it doesn't change a thing, it changes everything- for the better, for what we could be).

Years, actually.

Initially, that animal attraction swiped me, cut me. I saw you and I thought: Wow. I'd tell you this, but your reactions to things are so unpredictable, and I can barely say "hi" without stuttering and/or turning a fierce shade of the blush family when I see you, so maybe you'll read this and understand, but I bet not. The reading part. I think you'd understand. You would if you wanted to.

Process(ing)

Yesterday, my Voice of Reason told me that I'm living my life (finally?), and it's clear that the chains that tied me to her (great lakes) have been broken. Busted. Shot apart.

On one hand, I completely agree. I am being spontaneous (ie: trip to San Diego this weekend), social (spending a lot of time with my friends, especially Quack, and even going out), and the truth is, I do feel happy. Happier? Happy. I can't tell the difference, but I know I feel different.

On the other hand, I completely fucking disagree- but only on the chains being broken part. I dream about her (GL) far too often. About twice a week. And in every dream I have about her, we are getting back together. There is always kissing, and usually a segue into sex, if not flat-out nudity and sex. Her mom is almost always there (not during the sex, thankfully), and she makes a point to tell me how happy she is that I'm giving her daughter another chance. One dream, last week, her mom told me that she knows her daughter is doing better, but she's still not great, and she is simply grateful that I'm trying again.

I'm not trying again. There's been no contact since I told her to stop contacting me, and that was at the beginning of May. My birthday went by- no word. Her birthday eclipsed without me giving in. For a while, the fact that she didn't contact me hurt like hell. Some days, it still does. Most of the time, I'm grateful for the clear break.

But to say that the chains are broken... I wish with all my heart that I could agree. 98% of my heart, anyway. There is that lingering piece that still loves her and cares about her, even after all the hurt and bullshit she contributed to. That part, I really can't figure out except that she played such a big part in the past 3 years of my life, and to completely cut off my emotions is quite difficult for me. Don't get me wrong... if I could do it, I would. I know there's no sense in that 2%. It's not a desire to have her back in my life, or a want to pursue her again. It's just feelings that haven't let go.

So maybe the chain has lost its steely bind. Perhaps it's been replaced by fishing wire. Invisible, but it cuts. Those mornings, like today, when I wake up from a dream of reunion? (Last night's took place in my bedroom, but bigger with a sofa, and both of her sisters, and her mom [again, happy], and these weird poster-sized fragmented drawings from presumably the girl that she is with [whether just in the dream, or reality, too]. I ripped up one of the drawings. She then threw both of them away; they were scrawled with childlike writing [ironic] of how much this person loves and misses my ex. After she threw them away, she was struggling to take her shirt off, and she had quite the belly, and I said, "Wow, my love has gained some weight!" And I didn't care, I just wanted her, and we were together. Again.) The mornings don't hurt- they simply weigh heavy on my heart.

But I am moving on. I will see C today, continue to get to know her. I've pretty much dismissed S because of her weird little "I'm not psycho like that" thing, after seeing something that she assumed was something it wasn't. Sounds oh just a bit too similar to Great Lakes.

As for the Obscure Object? I'm at a loss there. My mouth and heart are itching to spill it- especially after what I was told last night, about her spending the least amount of time possible at home. But my brain resists, maybe knowing my heart better than I'd ever thought.

I just hate how I was feeling great over the last week, and today I've got this plague hanging over my head. All because of the tricks my mind plays on me while I'm sleeping.

catch & release

Flash interruption: here and (too quickly) gone. Her eyes were the most crystalline of blues-- and I think they always are, but I've somehow missed that. I don't miss it anymore; ever since she stopped being black and white and edged into this surreal world of piercing color, I can't miss any of it/her. I don't know how she's managed to keep me hooked for 3 years, but my god, the things I still want to do to her: over, and over, and over again.

hallucination.

It may have been a creak in the house, or maybe
it was the churning, squealing repetition of the Pathfinder's fan belt-
a noise I've heard countless times before, a teeth-clenching
screech that eased its deterioration into my ears
starting last spring. April 2008, to be exact,
the dismal aftermath of our first major dissemination,
the time you called me from 300+ miles away
blamed me for your tragic downfall (was this the third? sixth?)
told me you couldn't stand be away from me, but "told"
isn't anywhere near to the synthetic thud of your voice
which sometimes still ricochetes in the most tender spots of my body.
But this time, this night,

one week ago. It wasn't a creak, and it wasn't the squeal
of damaged car parts. It wasn't quite the thunder of your anger
vibrating from miles away. The dining room floor sprawled
beneath my bare feet and my body stilled, tensed, stilled,
drew up its breath and focus. Your voice still lives in this house.
Its plaintive pain-fueled echo

bruised me back to that particular October
the night I couldn't find you
the night you sat on the floor of my closet
legs bent and folded, torso hunched, eyes glazed
and full of calculated surprise as though
you knew I would rescue you, there,
two empty prescription bottles nestled against your thighs
your stare blank and uneven, turning to me
as I pushed open the door
and you didn't even try to hide
the blood, the flashing promises of black and blue,
your gripping hand aiming, puncturing, over and over
into your forearms and thighs, each penetration
depositing life-saving poison directly into your waiting blood stream.
All I knew to do was hold you against the shakes
and endless chattering of teeth, sleight and stutter of tongue,
dire lack of apology or explanation. And while you never

called out to me that night: two years later,
your absence finally clear, your voice let loose
in the skeletons of this house, finally
drawing the ruptured strength from my knees and heart.

prelude to disaster

if that was love, you can count me out. equations
don't mean shit to me anyway-- i nearly failed fifth grade math
and i'm incapable to adding up the number of times
you were good to me
and subtracting that quantity from the number of times
you so severely fucked me over that i couldn't find my legs
couldn't recognize strength to walk out
leave, or
disappear. & you told me: "this is who i am;
i will never change." which i must have thought was endearing
or cute or something that made my heart beat twice its limit
because i must have believed, then, that you were honest.
like the time you said: "i'll never do that to you, i'll never treat you
that way" and i fell for it- because that was thing to do, when you're falling
in love, you fall for everything- but the thing is- can you see this?-
what you did was incomparable to those tedious flits of fuck-ups.
you may not have fucked the other girl
but you let her in, and out, and in and out.
do you even remember how many times
you tried to kill yourself
in the midst of our love-struck wanderings?
do you remember august, in gramercy. the fight
with your mom- how you were "happy" but she pushed you
over the edge and it scared you how everything was good
and you still wanted to die.
or late january, in essex. your dad
wrestling a gun out of your hands. and how you'd begged me that very day
to come up early. and i couldn't. i should have known, or-
that big fight, april?, when you fell away
just to enjamb yourself back ever so slightly to let me know
that yes, you'd had to go to the hospital. because you wanted
to hurt yourself. but you didn't want to talk about it.
for days.
again. and then that summer.
it was always as if i was one step behind you,
never seeing what should have been so obvious.
when you tried to end us in june- because you didn't know how to be happy-
what a fucking cop-out (even though it's true). and the shitstorm of georgia:
the yelling, the mania, the constant fights, the ruin of two summer weeks.
enter october, 2007. someday i'll ship you a prize
awarding you the esteemed award for contributing heavily
to the worst month of my life.
i guess you can't understand (or care) that every time i open my closet
i see you there, cross-legged on the floor, your eyes wide and stark
blood and bruises caking your arms, epi-pen angled toward your veins,
scratches and pin-pricks spotlighting where you'd already stabbed,
empty pill bottles next to your feet. how i held you that night,
my arms a vice grip around your trembling form. we couldn't stop
the shaking: not then, not ever. and then-
no, it wasn't over-
how weeks later you tugged me into your grasp; we were standing
in a door frame, essex again, you said how sorry
you were, and how embarassed
you were. how that wouldn't happen again. and truly, it wasn't until months later-
april again, 2008, when you called me and ranted, bitched,
threw a fucking fit and ended us. then checked yourself into the psych ward
not two hours after that hang up.


that's just it.
those weeks.
that's where
we are now.
not us, but
time. and it
shakes me
to my core.
april-may.
i won't give
you my tears
my heart
my lifeline.
not anymore.
you had
your chances.

Fuck You

"Fuck you" doesn't cut it anymore. They're just words,

language strung beneath the gritty shit

that truncates my soliloquies and tequila-capped one-liners.

FUCK you doesn't tell you what I feel.

The vowels can't reach around their horse-shoed roundness

to slap the things-I've-never-told-you across your face,

and the consonants, hard and thick against my teeth, swing

open-hinged in the bluster of (what I intend to be a) frozen

downpour of tucked-away truths. But honesty never floods out that way;

it sneaks behind years of calm cool steady and fuck YOU

sounds too much like i hate you leave me alone you don't mean fucking

shit to me and these aren't lies, not anymore. And if I had the vocal energy

I might scream and whisper FUCK YOU fuck you FUCK YOU fuck you

over and over again, till my throat breaks raw and danger-red,

till my mouth and arms seize and spasm, and till my nails

snap off clean from clawing boundaries

and barriers, leaving new skin scathed and pale,

but there isn't any blood because blood is red

and red is love

and love was you

and you were blood but

fuckyou is boiling and endless, sworn like a furtive groan-

like a scalded wound peeled open again (and again, again).

Fuck.

You. 

This drops like dead weight, and "fuck you"

doesn't mean anything to me.

Not anymore. 

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 

Sometimes I take the fishing line that is twisted around my neck

and tug a little harder, testing the cut against my skin and I

pick up scissors, weigh them against gravity, slide my fingers

into gaping plastic holes. Open, close. Open, close.

Today I'm thinking about time. Twelve hours
every weekend, strapped into my car. 360-odd miles,
the ones I counted to the music breaking into my wandering mind,
and the ones that escaped me in a mad blur. I don't know what this means:
my drive, metaphorical and not, my pull to your push, the serenade
of touch and go, check your brakes, don't get too close and
why aren't you coming closer. 9:00 or after, picking up my feet
when all I wanted was to drag- the mess of your existence
scattered over every spare space. The dust was intoxicating
and I liked it best when you were awake, reposed
and smiling, your small hands outstretched to draw me in.
Sometimes you slept, your mismatched form twitching
and your mouth slack as I stood in the doorway, listening,
waiting, my inner battle of fear and hope pummeling against
my ribs. We were a tragedy, puppets strung out
in interrupted consciousness, jerking our own strings as the stream of life
passed neatly as though nothing outside existed.

can it make you feel love, love, love, love

Again, in my dreams. You're always there, on a semi-schedule of something like every other night. Sometimes you're laid up in my bed with the flu, and I'm bringing you water with a scoop of chocolate ice cream foaming at the top of the glass. Or you're sitting in my living room, two little sleeping bodies nestled into the furniture, and you're kissing their heads and looking at me. Or we're breaking into each other's personal space, the break-in, the rush, the almost-maybe-we-should. And we have, in my dreams, maybe twice. Mouths pressing into passion at the very least, and I can bring to memory at least one dream in which I fucked you- endlessly, wordlessly, wrapped and bathed in the curiousity that never fails to make me flush when you enter the room.

Last night, you were across the room, sitting on a chair on band concert risers. I was sitting in a folding chair on the floor of the room. Girlyman was there, or at least 2/3 of them: Nate and Ty. They were going to perform, but they had this weird extra band with them, and I wasn't happy about it. Then everyone else there said they wanted Nate and Ty to play Christian rock songs, and I started getting pissed, and I looked at my phone and you'd sent me a text message but I don't remember, now awake, what it said. But I got up and walked to you, behind you, and you turned ever so slightly to see me. I don't know what was said, but somehow, as dreamland tends to do, we were fast-forwarded without motion into my kitchen. We stood at the butcher block island, and the back door was open: the air was spring. You took my right hand and said, "I want to see the wonder," and I showed you what remains of the mystery stress-related mess on my fingers. The one purple dot still puffs on my pointer finger, and you ran your thumb over it in the most natural of ways, then flipped open your palm to show me a small purple circle scar. The same, somehow, but nothing of it. It was then that our foreheads bumped together, pausing within an inhale, the skin warm and smooth but the moment broken by my body stirring awake.

Almost maybe we should.